Close followers of Warren Buffett say Leopold Aschenbrenner could learn a lot from the veteran investor.
Fortune via Reuters Connect; Kevin Lamarque/Reuters
Every time a star investor implodes, Warren Buffett looks a little smarter.Leopold Aschenbrenner, 24, a Columbia valedictorian and former OpenAI researcher, was the toast of Wall Street after building a $45 billion hedge fund in under two years, and notching a 1,000% gain since inception this spring.But disaster struck his firm, Situational Awareness, in late July. A sharp downswing in AI stocks triggered margin calls from the firm's lenders, forcing a fire sale of most of its publicly traded stock portfolio to Ken Griffin's Citadel.Buffett, 95, who retired as Berkshire Hathaway's CEO at the turn of the year, successfully avoided catastrophe during his six decades in charge.Yet he also grew Berkshire's stock price by north of 6,000,000% in that timeframe, trouncing the S&P 500's 46,000% gain over the same period.Several of Buffett's close followers told Business Insider the Situational Awareness fiasco underscores two core tenets of his investing philosophy, and helps explain the enduring appeal of the Buffett approach.Ross Gerber, the CEO and cofounder of Gerber Kawasaki Wealth and Investment Management, said Aschenbrenner's implosion can be "understood as a lesson in hubris, leverage, and insufficient experience."
